


No Strings

by ruanyu



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Barebacking, Bisexual Clint Barton, Clint Angst, Clint Feels, Clint Needs a Hug, Come Swallowing, Dom Phil Coulson, Dom/sub Undertones, Dubious Consent, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, No Safeword, Not Beta Read, Not Safe Sane and Consensual, Oral Sex, Phil Coulson Angst, Phil Coulson Has the Patience of a Saint, Phil Needs a Hug, Pining, Shameless Smut, Slut Shaming, Sub Clint, Temporarily Unrequited Love, clint is clueless
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-26
Updated: 2015-06-26
Packaged: 2018-04-06 07:06:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4212531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruanyu/pseuds/ruanyu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Phil takes him at his word. His hand grips, painfully, on a fistful of Clint's short hair and Clint hides his wince because he wasn't lying, he does like it rough. He wants this spike of pain with his pleasure and Phil wants him and Clint will take that even if the man he loves only plans to come by every so often for a no strings rough and ready fuck.</p><p>No strings is what Clint does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Strings

**Author's Note:**

> I think the summary makes the dub-con clear, but let me know if I should add anything to the tags. No beta.

It's not anything he believes will ever happen, so when it does he's caught off guard and the man who had just pushed him against his front door hard enough to shock the breath from his lungs stops. That's what gets to him, the control, just after the searing heat of his rough urgent desire. Phil checks. Doesn't just glance down, he looks into his eyes. Clint releases a shuddering breath, all that attention on him making him want to look away, look down, look anywhere but the keen scrutiny of those blue eyes.

"Okay," Phil says quietly and it's not a question but would accept a no for an answer.

Clint licks his bottom lip, staring up at his handler with bated breath. His handler, who had just a few minutes ago been lambasting him for taking too many risks and for not going to medical to get checked out like he was told. Clint had shrugged away the blame, insisting that the mission had been saved because of those risks, insisting that he was alright. He was just done bandaging the graze on his arm when Phil whirled him around with a hand to his shoulder and his eyes were blue sky overshadowed with anger and Clint had stumbled back in surprise and Phil had pushed him hard against the wall with a hand against his bare chest and then put his other hand on Clint's cheek in gentle counterpoint and stared into his eyes and it wasn't the way a handler looked at an asset he was dressing down, it was the way one man looked at another man he wanted to undress.

Phil doesn't kiss him. Clint wasn't expecting that, he really wasn't, of course it was never going to be that kind of a deal. 

So he's waiting to be bent over the battered couch and ridden hard and rough and then left there to recover while Phil pulls himself back together and then apologizes saying it'll never happen again and Clint knows he can't let this happen for his sanity, not if there will be regret and recriminations after.

He opens his mouth to say that when Phil bites his neck. Which, in Clint's mind, is the next best thing to kissing him. They end up making out like teenagers for a while, until Phil pulls him into the bedroom. Clint wants to stop this but he can't, he is too far gone, and he goes down when he's shoved onto his bed, because he discovers Phil is just as commanding, just as assertive in bed as when he's doing his job, when he's issuing orders in that fast, calm even tone.

"Hands on the rail," Phil tells him, and when Clint immediately obeys, hands clasped around the rails of the headboard, Phil's blue eyes widen and his breath comes sharp. As though he thought Clint wouldn't obey.

Clint always obeys. He might be a smart alec about it, but he always does as Phil tells him. 

Phil stops then, hands hovering over where Clint wants them to be. Phil looks like he knows he should stop but doesn't want to. Clint doesn't want him to. He says it mutely with his wide eyes, says it with the urgent tilt of his hips.

And then his fly is undone and Phil's leaning forward with his hands bracing Clint's thighs wide apart, breath soft and warm on his cock. He looks up at Clint, who hasn't said a word yet, and then he bends down and engulfs the head of his cock with his mouth and his warm hands cradle his balls and stroke the seam between them at the same time.

Clint's hips thrust up once before Phil pulls off him, leaving his swollen cock glistening and bobbing in the air. "Stay still," he says, expecting to be obeyed this time, and Clint looks down at him and swallows hard at the sight and his hands clench on the headboard rail and he doesn't move while his handler leisurely sucks and licks at his cock, capable hands holding him almost delicately, thumbs rubbing against the sharpness of his hip bones. It's a loose hold yet was as sure as if Phil had been gripping him hard enough to bruise because Clint wouldn't shift an inch in case those hands slipped from their tentative position. He wanted Phil's hands on him forever.

When Phil feels his balls draw up and hears the hitch of his breath he pulls back and his hand curls around his cock and gives a brief warning squeeze at the base, making Clint gasp. "Don't come," Phil asks him, a request that had a commanding tone. "Not yet."

Phil looks at him until Clint nods silently, still not able to find his words, but wanting to show that he would do as he was told. Phil smiles, pleased, and Clint looks at him wonderingly. There's a flush to his handler's cheeks. He is given away by that flush and by the wicked darkness of his blue eyes and by the slick on his lips.

"I want to fuck you," Phil tells him, rough desire ragged in his voice.

Clint almost moves to drag off his jeans in response, imagines himself stark naked as he jacks his knees up then and there over Phil's shoulders or offers to turn over onto his hands and knees to be fucked by the man who is his boss and is still fully dressed in his tailored suit, shirt still buttoned up and tie still perfect and shoes gleaming.

He's lying down for this man because this man is the one he has dreamt about for the last two years but he's no fool and he hasn't lost his survival instincts. He shakes his head and then because he realizes he hasn't said a word since Phil pushed him against the wall, he clears his throat and says, "No."

His words pull Phil back into himself, into the collected calm agent Clint knew, brought out that familiar analytical crinkle of his brow.

"You usually top?" Phil asks, inclining his head slightly. There's no surprise in his voice, and no disappointment, even though Clint has been so accommodating until now, has been almost embarrassingly submissive.

Clint's lips tug to the side. "Sometimes. With men I usually bottom." He knows Phil knows this. His handler regards him seriously, like he's a puzzle.

"Then?"

Clint is silent, not wanting to have to explain, not knowing how to explain. He lets his hands drop to the bed and pushes himself up on his elbows. His hard-on has flagged and he moves to tuck his cock back in his jeans.

If anyone had told him that he would one day have this, have Phil asking to fuck him…and then say no, he would have laughed.

But he could see where this was going and it hurt to have his dream half-formed, to have the usual rough no strings sex he always had, only with the man he wanted so much more with. He couldn't put that into words. There was no way he could put that into words. And even if he could, of course they couldn't date. What was he thinking? This had to be secret, had to be a no strings thing, a handler and his asset with benefits thing.

He curses himself when Phil's expression shifts to a worried one and his handler frowns slightly as he withdraws with a sudden abruptness and stands at the end of the bed. "Should I have asked you out first?" he asks, soft, stricken. "I didn't think…"

He's kind enough to stop himself, because he knows that Clint knows that everyone knows his reputation as a love 'em and leave 'em guy. Will fuck or be fucked by anyone, but don't expect a repeat performance. 

Phil is still looking at him, trying to figure him out. "You want to do the going out for coffee thing?" The offer is tentative, gentle. It's just like Phil. Always ready to do the polite, gentlemanly thing even when what he really wanted was a quick and dirty illicit fuck with his asset.

Clint feels like his heart has been torn out of his chest and left on the floor for a herd of wildebeests to stomp on. He covers the twist of his expression with a short abrupt laugh. "Nah. I don't date."

Phil patiently waits for him to explain and Clint, glancing at him, realizes that he's still hard, cock tenting his pants impressively. He could have been mad. Could have called him a cock tease. Hell, he would be justified.

Clint has to fix this, thinks of an excuse quickly. Couldn't go with having a headache. He lets a half smug, half shamefaced smile grow on his face and wrinkles his nose. "I'm…still sore."

Phil's expression flickers immediately to the graze on his arm, assuming he meant he'd been hurt by the mission, worse than that visible injury suggested.

Clint shakes his head. "Not that. I was at a party last night and…went home with someone. I'm up for it, just…the guy was kind of hung like a horse."

He keeps his eyes on Phil, hoping for something, some flicker of jealousy or possessiveness, but Phil's expression is bland and smooth. If anything, he seems relieved.

"So, raincheck?" Phil asks, lips quirking the tiniest bit.

Clint's heart thumps. "I can do something about that though," he says, looking down at Phil's crotch.

Phil's about to object, he can see it, but Clint is already sliding to his knees. Phil shuts up with an audible click of his jaw when Clint folds his hands behind his back and leans forward to unzip Phil with his teeth.

Phil has a beautiful cock, cut and clean with a sweet pink head that Clint bends forward to lick, hiding the gentleness and revereness of the action with a teasing archness, designed to get Phil to growl at him and tell him to get on with it. But Phil doesn't snap at him, just takes a shaky breath and waits as Clint parts his lips and makes them a warm wet seal, sliding Phil's length into his mouth and down his throat smoothly.

Clint can tell Phil is impressed when he gasps softly and his hand settles on the back of Clint's head gently but he doesn't pull or tug his hair.

Clint is allowed to set the pace because Phil is letting him dominate and it sits uneasily with Clint, knowing that Phil's is here because he wants something rough, wants someone who could take what was usually held back by Phil's reserve and his inhuman control.

He pulls back and Phil lets him go, doesn't even react when his cock bobs against Clint's cheek."I like it rough, boss," Clint says, crude and deliberate. "Fuck my face as hard as you like, it's my ass that's sore."

The words are the right ones, because there's a frission of lust and hunger in Phil's eyes. Clint licks his lips. It was worth it. Giving Phil what he wanted had to be worth it.

Phil takes him at his word. His hand grips, painfully, on a fistful of Clint's short hair and Clint hides his wince because he wasn't lying, he does like it rough. He wants this spike of pain with his pleasure and Phil wants him and Clint will take that even if the man he loves only plans to come by every so often for a no strings rough and ready fuck.

No strings is what Clint does.

He forces back the strange dreams he's had of candlelight and soft laughter and a slow tenderness and some hazy notion of lovemaking. He's never made love with anyone. 

The next time, Phil calls in advance. "Hope you're not sore tonight," he says, matter of fact, like he's asking about his asset's post mission condition.

Clint laughs obligingly, hopes it doesn't sound as strange and strained to Phil as it does to him. "No, took home a woman yesterday. A fiery little redhead. The curtains matched the carpet too." He was lying. He hadn't. Hadn't taken anyone home since Phil pushed him against the wall.

Phil chuckles, indulgently. "What is it the kids say? TMI? I'll be there in half an hour. Okay with you?"

"Sure."

Clint has prepped himself by the time Phil is there. He answers the door naked and stretched and lubed, ready to go, just stick it right in there. He gives Phil a filthy grin. For a moment he wonders whether Phil wanted more mystery, more foreplay, more anything. But it turns out, all Phil wanted was to pound Clint's ass.

"How'd you want me, sir?" he asks, looking up through his lashes, and watches his calm competent capable Phil turn into that other man who wanted nothing more than a quick rough fuck.

Their first time is not even on the bed because they don't get there. Phil shoves Clint down onto his hands and knees and parts his legs with a thrust of his knee. But for his undone fly and his cock thrusting out of his boxers, Phil is still fully dressed. He unrolls his own condom on his cock and then pushes all the way into Clint with one long smooth glide that catches his prostate on the first thrust. It's beautiful because they fit together like they were meant to be. It shouldn't matter that Phil doesn't want to see his face. Of course he doesn't want to see his fucking ugly face. Why would he? He was there to fuck his ass and that was all.

Clint loves and hates every second of his first time under Phil.

He tried to touch his throbbing cock but he wants to keep the position Phil put him in on hands and knees so he doesn't touch himself. Phil pounds into him, long hard thrusts that end with the smack of flesh on flesh. On the last thrust he pulls almost all the way out and then all the way in before he grunts and comes.

Clint hasn't been told to move them so he keeps his hands where they are, but he is desperate to thrust against something and that makes him whimper pitifully until Phil takes pity on him and wraps a warm hand around him and then Clint shamelessly and gratefully rocks into Phil's fist and when he comes, hard and hot and plentiful, it splatters onto the floor, and he sees as he glances down, over Phil's beautifully shined shoe.

Phil doesn't say anything, just withdraws and moves to discard the condom. Clint pushes himself up and blinks his usual post-coital sleepiness away. He sees the white slime across Phil's shoe and crawls towards him and bends down to quickly lick his slimy jism off the smooth leather, making his Phil shiny and neat again as fast as he could.

Phil's face is a sight to behold, somewhere between repulsed and fascinated by the perverseness of the action. His hand combs Clint's sweaty hair back and his touch is gentle, but when the overwhelming rush of that sweet touch fades Clint hears the softly murmured words and wants to curl up and hide under his duvet and spend the night crying. "You really are a slut, aren't you?"

And Clint's good at what he does, so he hums in agreement and obliges when Phil wants him to open his mouth wide and show him the pearly cooling come on his tongue, and he swallows it down with a blithe smile.

 

The fifth time they fuck Phil takes him over the kitchen table and doesn't realize until after that Clint's wearing about a dozen deep bruises around his ribcage. Clint can't hide his wince as he leverages himself up and Phil, looking troubled, grabs him and lifts up the t-shirt Clint had deliberately not removed. What he sees makes his lips tighten into a thin hard line and Clint wants to pull away but Phil grips his shoulder tighter and smoothes a thumb over his cheek and asks in a quiet voice for a safe word.

Clint pulls back and smirks at him and tells him not to be a bore and Phil raises his brows and insists with a familiar firmness.

"We're not doing this otherwise, Clint," he says, calmly, implacably.

Maybe it was that Phil said his name. Maybe it was that calm, resolved tone. Maybe it was that they'd agreed to bareback for the first time and he could feel the come trickling down his thigh. Whatever it was, something twisted in Clint's heart and said enough.

Clint rubbed his brow wearily. "Fine," he says shortly, stripping off his t-shirt and letting it drop to the floor, heading for the shower.

Phil waits for a moment, not understanding, thinking this was capitulation but when Clint turns away from him, Phil reaches out and touches his forearm and asks, uncertainly, "Clint? Baby?"

Clint's brows jump at the endearment, looking at Phil's hand on him.

"Did you just call me baby?" he asked, trying for a derisive tone.

Phil's cheeks pink a little but he doesn't move his hand and the touch of that hand, just that simple touch, made Clint shiver. They haven't touched like this, the intimate quiet touches of two people who slept together semi-regularly. Not yet and now it looked like not ever. Phil hadn't wanted that from him. He'd just wanted no strings rough sex. They weren't a couple. And this, the gentle touch, the endearment, it was because he'd just seen the bruises. Phil was a good man, so he was concerned. It came out of guilt, Clint knew that. But it stirred the yearning in Clint to be truly wanted, to be loved, if not by this man then by someone, sometime.

He could not take the pretense anymore.

"Take your hand off me, Coulson," he said.

"Because I asked you for a safe word?" Phil says, taken aback. But he dropped his hand immediately. His blue eyes looked desperate, almost anguished. It was nice to know how much he valued his rough sex.

Clint gave a casual one-shouldered shrug. "You know I get bored. I would have broken it off anyway." He smiled, bland. "You're lucky, I don't usually give repeat performances."

Phil steps back, as though physically repulsed by the words. His mouth twists and his voice has an edge of contempt when he says softly, vindictively, "I've heard that about you. You've got a reputation."

Clint can't disguise his flinch at the hurtful comment and Phil for a moment looks pleased that his barb hit its mark and Clint hates him for a brief intense second and then he wishes he could really hate him, wishes he could stop loving the bastard, wishes he'd never met him.

Phil had taken off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves and removed his tie. He looked almost casual. This wasn't SHIELD Phil. This was someone else. This someone could be the other half of a couple. They could be a couple having an argument.

Except the concern has left Phil's face and it has become an expressionless mask and there is that hardness to his eyes.

He picked up his jacket and began unrolling his sleeves, buttoning the top button of his shirt, becoming Agent Coulson again. Clint couldn't bear to turn away, to miss the last glimpses of the man he'd wanted more than anything to get to know, to throw away all his disguises for, to do things with that could not be described using the verb fuck. He wanted to sleep with, to make love with Phil. He wanted to know what it meant to make love.

"I'll ask for you to be transferred to another handler," Phil tells him quietly, having gathered himself again. "I should never have…" He stops himself, abruptly, presses his lips together. "I suppose it's a good thing it ended so soon."

Clint tries to make himself say "I suppose." It breaks somewhere in the middle and he hides it with a big yawn.

Phil gives a little snort, shaking his head, rueful. "You should get to your shower, Clint," he says, not unkindly, disarmingly gentle, as he passes him on his way out of the door. "You'll catch a cold."

The door closes behind him with a quiet dignified finality and Clint stands there, staring into nothing, thinking that if he does what his handler - no, not his handler, not anymore - ordered him to do and go take a shower, he would be washing away every last trace of Phil forever.

He can't make himself move to the shower. Instead he gets out the bottle of vodka Nat had given him for a gift. He throws back too much of it in one go and the burn hits him hard and he remembers that he hadn't had breakfast.

He looks around for his clothes and then he sees Phil's tie on the floor. It was just lying there, on the floor, discarded. Clint kneels and picks the tie up carefully, holds its length in both his big rough hands. 

After a while, his knees start to hurt and he shivers and he realises that he must have been kneeling on the floor for a while.

Then there's a knock on the door and before he can come out of his fugue the door opens and there are quick steps and someone is by his side and he can hear the alarm in Phil's voice as he reaches out to him.

"Clint? Clint, are you okay?" Clint shivers at the touch and tries to answer but his mind was wrapped in layers of cotton, fighting for clarity.

Phil's hands are so warm, leave a trail of blissful heat. "Jesus, you're as cold as ice." He draws Clint to him, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, surrounding him with warmth and familiarity. Clint can hear Phil's heartbeat, steady and sure. He has a calm heartbeat, of course he has. Clint doesn't want to move. Not ever. He stays still and stares down and wishes he could make himself less pathetic but he can't, he doesn't want to move.

"Clint? Talk to me."

The familiar terse worried command trips him into speech.

"I couldn't," Clint chokes out.

Phil touches his cheek, like he did that first time. "Couldn't what?"

"Do w-what you told me. I wanted to k-keep your smell." His teeth are chattering. "Just for a little bit. I'm s-sorry."

Phil whispers a soft curse and Clint flinches back from him. "I'm s-sorry," he repeats, miserably. "I know you d-don't want me like that."

Phil shakes his head. "Clint…"

The soft deep regret in his voice is like salt rubbed deep in the wound. Clint clamps his jaw shut because he wants to babble apologies forever. He wants to say it's fine, I'll get over it, you don't have to pretend, you don't have to be sorry. It's just me you see, I was stupid and went and fell in love with you and I wanted you so bad I thought I could take just this no strings thing and it would be enough and I couldn't, I just couldn't, I'm sorry…

"Come here," Phil whispers and draws him back into his arms and kisses his temple and smoothes back his hair, "Jesus, it's me who should be saying sorry. I thought that this was all I could hope for. I wanted so much more with you but I didn't want to scare you away, I know you don't do relationships. I came back to apologize, tell you we could start again. Do you understand, Clint?"

Clint can't say anything anymore because his mouth would run away from him. He stares at Phil and knows that he looks disbelieving and confused and drunken and scared because Phil's expression softens and his eyes go sad. "You don't believe me, do you?"

"Y-you don't have to pretend," Clint mutters, rubbing his chest, something there hurting like a lump of metal, like his heart has turned into Stark's reactor. "I'm a big boy."

Clint ducks his head because he doesn't need to be pitied and Phil tilts his chin up. "I'll have to prove it to you then," he says and then reaches out to put his arm around Clint's shoulders. "Come on, lets get you up before you get pneumonia."

Clint goes with him, stumbles a little standing up, but Phil supports him. "Warm shower or bed?" Phil asks, gently.

Clint looks down at himself, wrinkles his nose. "I smell of vodka and sex," he says, unsteadily. "I'd better shower first, huh?"

Phil smiles at him, tiny laugh lines around his eyes. "Vodka and sex aren't so bad."

"You don't mind?"

"Mind?"

"Fucking me when I'm...like this?"

Phil stops then, a terrible look on his face. "Clint, I'm not going to fuck you."

Clint looks at him. "Oh."

"Why would you think...?"

Clint struggles to explain. "You said shower or bed and..."

Phil stops his explanation, tilting his chin up and covering his lips with his own. It's a kiss, a real couple kiss, hungry and tender at once.

"I want you, Clint. You. Not just sex."

Clint swallows. The reality of their first kiss cuts through the fog in his mind.

"Not no strings?" He asked, and then, more coherently, "You want this to be…a relationship? Not just fucking?"

Phil shakes his head. "Not just fucking. As many strings as you'll allow," he said, softly.

Clint stared at him. "Oh."

In the end, they take that shower together, standing under the cascading warm water, and afterwards they climb under the sheets and hold each other and Phil doesn't want anything from him. It was the first time he'd slept with someone, and this, what they were doing now, could not be described using the word fucking.

"Tomorrow, we'll start again," Phil whispers.

Clint rubs his cheek on Phil's chest, his head resting just so he could hear his heart beat. "Tomorrow."

It sounded like a great plan.


End file.
